A single workhead internal grinding machine with a wheel head mounted on a compound slide assembly is described in U.S. Pat. No. 4,419,612 issued Dec. 6, 1983 to Kazimierz J. Reda et al. An electro-mechanical control system for controlling all of the movements of the compound slide system is provided and utilizes a control computer interfaced with servo-drive means which in turn control slide electric drive motors.
In use, the grinding wheel carried on the wheelhead of such a grinding machine eventually wears to the point where it must be replaced. The grinding wheel is typically fixedly mounted on a shaft or quill which is chucked in the wheelhead spindle. In the past, replacement of a quill with a worn wheel involved shutting down the grinding machine and manually replacing a worn wheel with a new one. Of course, the time and labor required for grinding wheel quill replacement was lost production time and added labor cost to machine a particular part.